Only one-fifth of Russians have positively assessed economic reforms conducted by late Yegor Gaidar in Russia in the 1990s, a poll from the All-Russian Public Opinion Research Center (VTsIOM) said.
Gaidar, a leading figure in Boris Yeltsin's highly controversial economic reforms in the years after the collapse of the Soviet Union, died on Wednesday of an unexpected blood clot at around 03:00 Moscow time (Midnight GMT). He was 53.
"Several years later, only 17% of Russians have positively assessed the work of the 'reformation government,' whose economic bloc was headed by Gaidar at that time, while 58% of Russians expressed a negative assessment," a statement from VTsIOM said.
The all-Russian poll was conducted in December of 2007.
Gaidar was one of the 'young reformers', along with Anatoly Chubais and Boris Nemtsov, who oversaw the rapid introduction of a free market to Russia in the early 1990s, including mass privatizations and price deregulation.
While the reforms were hugely unpopular among ordinary Russians - causing inflation to skyrocket, wiping out the savings of millions of people, and allowing vast wealth to fall into the hands of a well-connected elite - some argue that the rapid reforms were the only way of averting greater disasters.
Gaidar was acting prime minister in the second half of 1992, but parliament never confirmed him as premier. He left the government in 1994, and was elected to serve two terms in the State Duma, in 1993-1995 and 1999-2003.
Gaidar was born March 19, 1956 in Moscow, the son of former Navy admiral and journalist Timur Gaidar and grandson of writer Arkady Gaidar. He is survived by his wife, three sons and daughter.
MOSCOW, December 16 (RIA Novosti)
